The town of Cuamba is isolated from the rest of Mozambique since last Monday (11), after several days of torrential rain. While the people seek help, the rulers in Maputo are worried about their jobs and emergency teams “come from helicopter to say hello to people but when it is to rescue people there are no helicopters”.
In the mid-morning of the day the new members of the Mozambican Parliament took possession a citizen resident in Cuamba reported that Muanda River was raising. After some hours the river climbed its banks and submerged the road that connects one of the most important trading posts of the Niassa province with the capital. “Is no longer possible to pass to Mecanhelas” she reported us and added “it is no longer possible to leave Cuamba to Nampula due to the increase in the flow of the Muandá River that flooded a section of national road No. 8”.
During the rest of the day the rain didn’t give truce, having fallen over 70 millimetres of rain that turned the flood in inundation.
Almost simultaneously the Namutimbwa River also kept rising and eventually also get out of its bed and flooded the road and railway line, between the municipality and the province of Nampula.
On Tuesday (12), some workers of the ongoing rehabilitation along these lines have been “swallowed” by the waters. It has not been possible to establish whether they were caught off guard or in a thoughtless act they tried to cross the road, figuring that the waters would not be too great. At least two heavy vehicles plunged. We could not determine what happened to the occupants.
The railway line, which ensures the transport of people and goods between Nampula and Cuamba, and vice versa, was also submerged in a section where a train derailed.
“The bridge towards Mandimba also is flooded. No energy for more than 15 hours and communications are very weak” reported us Margarida, a resident of Cuamba, who claims that “hundreds of people have lost their homes that have fallen due to flooding (…). There are people on top of rocks, on top of trees”. According to our source, “the older residents of the town say they don’t remember being so bad for many years.”.
Questioned about the presence of the governmental authorities who provide support, including emergency teams from the National Disaster Management Institute, which decreed red alert for the region of Margarida, lamented in the following terms. “They come by helicopter and say hello to people but when it is to rescue people there are no helicopters. A sad reality”.
Floods isolate Zambézia
However, in Zambézia province flood-drama never stops growing. In Mocuba about tens of thousands people sleep in classrooms (primary and secondary schools), other in the shops and homes on high ground. Who wasn’t hit does everything to help those affected but regrets the weak government support. “Yesterday, there they gave us raw food, there is no stove nor cooking form”.
The eighteen children, surprised in initiation rites, are still reported missing, including their godparents.
In Licungo River the waters did not go low. “The houses were flooded up to the ceiling” Velmilde told us, resident of Mocuba that unfolds with others less affected to provide all the possible support. “We gave something for breakfast, we will give lunch.
The young laments the slow intervention of authorities. “There is a lifeboat stationed in the police when there are people in the middle of water”.
Still in Zambézia province there is registration of three dead in the District of Ile, victims of collapse of a wall. The road link between Morrumbala and the administrative post of Chire is interrupted; the river level rose and dragged the metal bridge that existed there.
There is no connection by road with the districts in the North of Zambézia, Gurué, Ile, e.g. Namarrói, Alto Molócuè and-Gilé.
The National Institute of meteorology predicts the continuation of very strong rainfall (more than 75 mm of rainfall in 12:0 am), accompanied by thunderstorms and moderate winds (up to 70 kilometres per hour) till Thursday (15) in the provinces of Sofala, Zambézia, Tete, Nampula and Niassa.
